WARNING: Spoilers Off applies to Moments pages. This includes plot details for the works that Sage is reviewing. You Have Been Warned!
- His review of Grave of the Fireflies, which he explains was very hard to do, considering the reputation it has would make any dissenting opinion of his come off as petty and/or nitpicky. Regardless, Sage flat out nails it, going into detail about how the movie seemed to be less of a stand alone story and more of a cautionary tale for the youth of Japan. Bennett even brings up statistics of how crime rates amongst the youth skyrocketed in the 1980's because of conflicts between the privileged newer generation, who were enjoying the wealth and success of Japanese industry and their parents, who had to live in Japan after the second world war. Sage states at the beginning that he didn't like this movie for more personal reasons rather than just because it was sad. After deconstructing the movie's purpose (guilt tripping the youth of Japan into respecting the sacrifices their parents had made just growing up), he just demonstrates an amazing sort of bravery to get so involved and determined to critique a movie of such acclaimed proportions. It was a very impressive, sobering review, and you can watch it here
. - In his review of Odin, Sage demonstrates impressive knowledge in physics during his ripping apart of the movie's lack of logic during a scene where the spaceship demonstrates its hyperspace drive capable of reaching relativistic speeds while going after an SOS signal it was seeking out, six days after departing from base.
- In the review of 8 Man After he learns that the hero of the original 8 Man (1963) series was just deleted from his cyborg body, Killed Off for Real basically, with no explanation as to why or how. A comparison of how DC Comics does character death more gracefully has Linkara cameo to remind us of Ted Kord, to which Sage angrily counters (to the point his shouting causes feedback in the audio) that Ted got some final lines and an on panel death, whereas the hero of the original anime got none of this. Linkara, whose rage is practically legendary, backed off.
- He also called out Sachiko on calling out the new 8 Man, as she was making it look like she was in favor of the psychotic football-playing cyborgs that murdered a stadium full of people.
- It's also linked to something many have wanted Sage to review, as at the end, Sage revealed that he was gonna review Devilman, from the creator of Violence Jack.
- At the end of the Devilman review, Sage takes out Violence Jack as if it were the next review. It's even the uncut version, so rare that it can't even be found as a torrent... and he keeps it that way, throwing the rare VHS off a bridge into a stream with a 'good riddance' and spit.
- Though, to by the look of things with the cryptic after-credit bit, looks like it isn't gonna be the last time we seen that VHS tape as due to the darkness and red light coming out of the box before briefly on screen the words "VIOLENCE IS COMING" pops up in red before cutting to black. Either he didn't really throw the tape off the bridge or he's just not doing the uncut version.
- Or maybe it was a bootleg tape; but, only time will tell...
- Though, to by the look of things with the cryptic after-credit bit, looks like it isn't gonna be the last time we seen that VHS tape as due to the darkness and red light coming out of the box before briefly on screen the words "VIOLENCE IS COMING" pops up in red before cutting to black. Either he didn't really throw the tape off the bridge or he's just not doing the uncut version.
- In A Wind Named Amnesia, it's revealed that aliens were the ones responsible for enforcing Laser-Guided Amnesia upon humanity and reduced them to rioting savages and that the reason they did it was both because they wanted to eliminate a threat and to make humans be happy. Sage simply called them out on their bullshit, going with a rant about the hypocrisy of using technology to essentially destroy humanity as a civilized species... out of fear that humanity might become advanced enough to do the same thing to the aliens.
- In the Guyver film review, Sage getting tired of Critic's insults, calling him out and refusing to apologize or back down. Especially satisfying for anyone angry at the latter for acting like an asshole in reboot reviews.Critic: How can you not see it as bad? Was your brain and soul a package deal when you sold them?
Sage: Critic! Shut up. Alright? I just wanted you to have some fun riffing on a dumb movie with me, okay? You don't need to insult me. - In the Violence Jack review, the entire episode is about him working up the bravery to admit, on camera, that sometimes you need to admit that sometimes there isn't a way to do something, and that rarely, you have to Know When to Fold 'Em. In a quite good mini-movie.
- Not to mention, despite the fact that he can't show the anime itself, he manages to clearly show how horrible and gruesome it is, just by talking about the content and playing the audio in one scene.
- During his Æon Flux review, Oancitizen comes on to criticize him for lackluster analysis of Gnosticism within the show. By the end of his review, Oancitizen is applauding.
- In each of his Love Hina reviews, he repeatedly calls the show out for its blatant misandry and unwarranted abuse of its male lead, simply because he's male and possibly has a love life, while playing all of it for laughs.
- Mark the Engineer earns one in the Super Toolshed episode "Knight Makes Right," which was made right after he got in a car accident with his beloved Cool Car. While the whole situation sucked, he was quite proud of the fact that he was able to replace a single broken part and drive his car home... meanwhile, the other people in the accident probably had to total their car.
- Mark explains that this is largely a result of shifting design paradigms and safety standards- his car was made in a time when every car was made with a high-grade steel chassis, while modern cars (like the other one in the accident) have frames that are primarily constructed from fiberglass and aluminum with built-in crumple zones. While newer models are much safer, Mark's older car was far sturdier, and was thus able to get off with minimal damage.
- To add to Mark's awesomeness, he goes on a tangent about the diagnostic tools built into many modern vehicles. Specifically, the model of car he crashed into came standard with On-Board Diagnostics Mark II, which has built-in telemetry that constantly measures how fast a car's going and can't be erased. He's laughing like a madman at this, since it means it means the other guys won't be able to lie about their speed at the time of the accident.
- Mark explains that this is largely a result of shifting design paradigms and safety standards- his car was made in a time when every car was made with a high-grade steel chassis, while modern cars (like the other one in the accident) have frames that are primarily constructed from fiberglass and aluminum with built-in crumple zones.
- Putting in four hours of work to make the panty-shot counting gag in the Agent Aika review have all the shots. That's dedication.
- His analysis of how screwed up Inuyasha and Kagome's relationship is. He perfectly lays out how much of a Yandere Kagome is and even goes so far as to compare her abusive treatment of Inuyasha to a bad S&M relationship.
- He also calls out the Status Quo Is God ending to the third movie, noting that to get a new necklace on Inuyasha Kagome pretty much tricks him and then refuses to remove it even after the danger's past, admitting out loud she doesn't want to remove it. And then she tells him to sit. Bonus points occur when Bennett and Mark view this scene in the Nuts & Bolts commentary on this episode, with Mark outright calling Kagome a sociopath when she does this.
- The ending of his review of Fake, a gay anime, has Bennett reveal that the reason he chose to review it was because of an email from a fan. Said fan wanted to know if there was any gay-themed anime that wasn't yaoi or shonen-ai, and despite Bennett's searching, he couldn't find one. Bennett goes on to say that even lesbians have positive portrayals in anime, but gay men have none, which is "fucked up" and "depressing no matter how you slice it."
- In his review of De:vadasy, Sage is unafraid to tackle the thorny subject of Double Standard Rape: Female on Male - specifically, the scene in the second episode of the OVA where the scientist Misako sexually assaults the male protagonist Kei, ostensibly to gauge his compatibility to pilot the titular robot. Sage points out not only the squickiness of the scene due to the age differences between the two parties (Misako is an adult, but Kei is still a young teenage boy), or the fact that Misako is never called out on her behavior, but also that it — like many other scenes in the OVA — blatantly rips off a similar scene from Neon Genesis Evangelion without attempting to understand its original context.Explanation
- Alucard. THAT Alucard, threatened to "rip [Sage's] asshole out of [his] eye socket" if he ever reviewed the original Hellsing anime. Sage does this anyway despite the threat, and everyone knows Alucard doesn't threaten, he promises. Sure, he calls Integra out of concern on this, but he still goes through with it despite the risk. It takes balls to go against the fuckmothering vampire king like that.
- Adding to this, Alucard never shows up in the review after the opening. That means that Sage not only defied him, he got away with it!
- More of an awesome moment for Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust, but worth mentioning. Sage has been vocal in the past about his hatred for vampires, so you'd expect him to apply this same bias to Bloodlust, right? Wrong. Throughout the review, Sage has pretty much nothing but praise for the entire movie in animation, storytelling, and pacing. He doesn't even mind the melodrama of "vampires bemoaning that they're monsters" that Mayerling espouses to Charlotte because of how well acted it was. The film was that good.
- His "Oldtaku, New Tricks" review of My Hero Academia has Sage being pretty sincere about not liking it completely but praising the stuff he likes (and being outright venomous about the stuff he doesn't like, such as sarcastically "praising" yet another Tournament Arc and labeling Minoru Mineta a full-blown example of The Scrappy complete with a Precision F-Strike). Sage does all of this knowing that, as the "new hotness", he will probably get flak for it. But Sage reserves his most piercing vitriol for when he calls bullshit on a scene where Tomura Shigaraki gives a "What Is Evil?" speech to All Might. Sage argues that not only is such a speech a Cliché that has been driven into the ground by every Straw Nihilist in anime history, but the fact he's leading a terrorist attack on a school in the middle of doing it — and that he's the leader of an organization that calls itself "the League of Villains" — brings Shigaraki to unspeakable levels of hypocrisy.
- In his review of I Dream of Mimi, Suave manages to highlight the crucial difference between the main character of this and Tenchi.Suave: [Tenchi's female Love Interests] all came into Tenchi's life separately and for not-altogether related reasons. But they stayed because they like Tenchi and they liked Earth! And why wouldn't they like Tenchi? Even if he wasn't considerate and kind, at the very least, he was aware of their feelings and wasn't some clueless dipshit about it! Being someone that other people want to be around takes effort and consideration! You don't just bubble along in life attracting people, blow them off whenever it suits you, and treat them like crap, and expect them to be there the next day! Because you know what happens? They tell you they're gonna leave for smokes and... never come back.
